16 Hauntingly Beautiful Photos of Disney's Abandoned Water Park

It may be known as the happiest place on earth, but when Mickey and Minnie permanently retire to their mouse house, and all the beaming (okay, sometimes crying) tots leave for good, Disney World can cast a different type of spell.

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Renegade photographer Seph Lawless has given us a rare glimpse at what happens when a Disney property goes untouched for 15 years. His eerie pictures of River Country, Disney's first water park, that's been left to deteriorate since it shuttered in 2001, are as chilling as they are fascinating.

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Besides Discovery Island, Florida's River County, which opened in 1976 at Bay Lake, is only one of two Disney parks to ever close. Though it's not clear exactly why the park's happy reign ended, rumors have swirled that it was tied to a young boy's death, who was reportedly killed by a parasitic infection he contracted there.

The fine folks at Disney aren't exactly thrilled with Lawless rooting around, warning him to stay away, but he says he entered the property legally by a Disney boat and captured other images by drone.

According to Lawless, who spoke to the operators of Bay Lake, the water is now too polluted to swim in, thanks to years of nightly firework displays. The workers reportedly added that the fish in the lake are also too toxic to eat.